Many people live with chronic diseases, and must take medications according to specific dosage schedules in order to have healthier, longer, and overall higher quality of life. The specific dosage schedules often require patients to take certain medications at specific times each day. And for many, multiple medications and complicated schedules make it a challenge to manage that the appropriate dosages.
For this reason, solutions disclosing automatic medication dispensers which give the patient access to medication dosages at the right time have been adopted in the art.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,145,697 discloses a device for enabling a patient to have ready access to a daily dosage of medication placed in compartments at predetermined time periods. The device comprises an annular plate member having a plurality of medicine receiving compartments formed adjacent the periphery thereof. Specific dosages in the form of capsules or pills are sequentially placed in selected compartments. In a preferred mode, up to four compartments are loaded in sequence to provide one dosage, up to four sequences of four compartments allowing four daily dosages to be provided. An annular top cover member is positioned over the plate member, the cover member including a window or a door. The annular compartment containing member is controlled in a manner such that a selected compartment is positioned at a location under the window. When the window is so located, an alarm is energized to alert the patient that the dosage in that compartment is available for use. When the door is opened, the alarm is deactivated. An indexing mechanism is provided to rotate the plate member so that the adjacent compartment is rotated beneath the window. As the plate member is rotated, the window is automatically shut before the alarm for the next compartment is energized. A locking member is provided so that only the health provider can have access to all the compartments and thus determine if the patient has complied with the specified dosage regimen.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,136,666 discloses an apparatus for dispensing medications comprising a holder device containing a bottom surface, a sidewall engaging the bottom surface, a pair of radial walls adjoining a center of the bottom surface and the sidewall, and a sloped slide adjoining the pair of radial walls. In a preferred embodiment, the holder device further comprises seven pairs of radial walls to correspond with each day of the week. The present invention also includes a plurality of compartments within each pair of radial walls, which correspond to the time periods during which medication must be taken during a single day. Each compartment according to this embodiment contains a sloped slide. This solution further provides a method for loading the apparatus whereby a filling tray with wells is placed on the holder device, the filling tray is arranged so that each well empties into a compartment, a number of articles are poured onto the filling tray, and spread over the tray so that the desired number of articles fall into each well.
United States patent application US20070187423 discloses a medication dispenser that provides automation to the steps of locating and acquiring unit-based doses of certain medications to be administered to a patient. The dispenser includes a frame and one or more cartridges that may be mounted onto the frame. A set of slots sized for holding unit-based doses of medication extend through a body portion of the cartridge. A movement device is also positioned relative to the frame and is configured to induce movement of selected unit-based medication doses out of associated slots in the cartridge, so that the dispensed doses may be retrieved.
Among the commercially available products in the market, there is provided a portable medication dispenser called (e-pill medimi portable pill dispenser); wherein such dispenser can supply 1 or 2 medications up to 15 times per day.
The disclosed devices and apparatuses found in the prior art have to be modified in order to give the patient access to the right dosages of oral solid medications at the right time and at any place by providing a medication dispensing device that provides multiple weeks of dosages of multiple medications that must be taken at different times of day, and wherein that device has a portable component, that can be filled and unfilled automatically and wherein access can be controlled automatically.